"Mr. President, sir!" the general saluted. He spoke in an Italian accent, signifying that he was from pre-flood Italy, which had joined the USU.
"Ah, General Marcel, what's the update?" Atticus asked.
"We were able to breach the cavern, however, we are currently unable to deploy any aircraft. We will have to make use of helicopters and ground based vehicles to initiate contact, sir." the General said.
"And why is that?" Atticus asked in annoyance.
"We are unable to open the main door to the runway. The main door itself has a larger surface area than the cavern itself, and the cavern is right on top of the main doors," General Marcel said, "If we open it, the cavern might… no, the cavern will cave in and come crashing down on us."
"Who's bright idea was it to build the main door to the runway underneath a mountain?" the president asked sarcastically.
"Well, it wasn't a full on mountain back then. It has been a million years after all," he replied.
"It was a rhetorical question, general," the president sighed.
"I knew that sir, I thought it would have been funny," the general replied.
"Well, it wasn't," Atticus said.
"I agree sir," he paused and let the awkward silence take hold for a while, "I apologise, sir."
"Whatever," he said irritably, "What course of action do you suggest?"
"I would suggest using drones to scout out this… Ponyville… before proceeding. If they really do have the rest of humanity enslaved, I would suggest showing up with a considerable military force," he noticed the president's confusion and continued, "Of course, we should send a diplomat with a smaller guard detail first. If we send an entire army to the town which one of their nation's leaders supposedly lives in, they may take it as an act of war. If regular diplomacy fails, then we send an army, not to invade, but instead resorting to gunboat diplomacy by a show of strength."
"And if diplomacy, gunboat or not, fails?" the president questioned.
"Well, that depends. They literally used torches to light up the cavern, so if they really are that primitive… we could always resort to an invasion," the general said.
"Well, let's do everything we can to avoid a war," Atticus advised, "But I do agree with your suggestion. We should send in some drones to scout out the area first."
"Should I start preparing the drones, sir?" General Marcel asked.
"Not yet, I need to get approval from congress first," he sighed in frustration, "Then after that I'm going to have to address the UN and it would be better if I could get their approval as well."
"Yes, of course, sir," he said, "I'll get reception to put out an announcement right away."
"Very good. You go and do that. Dismissed," Atticus told him. He offered one final salute, and was on his way.
"Is everyone here?" the speaker asked the coordinator.
"We're still missing the leaders of… Laos, Singapore, South Africa, New Zealand, and Greece," the coordinator said.
"Please make an announcement and remind them of the meeting that is about to be held," the speaker said, straightening his tie.
The coordinator brought out his phone, "Hello, hiba?" He paused as someone on the other side of the call spoke. "Yeah, I wasn't listening," he paused once again as the voice came from the other side. "Well, check the cams!" his voice raised in frustration, "Send a team to get them to hurry up! I'm gonna have to start the meeting now, we can't wait for them. Tell them to get here as soon as they can." He hung up the phone.
"What's up?" the speaker asked.
"No idea what's taking them so long. Probably getting themselves ready," the coordinator said, "You can go ahead and begin without them."
"Very well, how do I look?" he said, throwing his hands to the side to showcase his black suit.
"You look great," the coordinator said in a hurried tone, "Go on, get going. I've got to go find the rest of the representatives."
The speaker headed into the USU House of Representatives. The representatives in question were all the leaders of the pre-flood nations that joined together to form the USU. President Atticus may have been the elected leader, but for something as important as this, he still needed to hold a majority vote for their course of action, where all the leaders of the pre-flood nations that joined America served as the voters.
The speaker walked up to his stand. There were three stands in the front-middle of the room. The president's stand was in the middle of the three, which was flaked on the right side by the vice president's stand, and on the left side by his own stand.
"Attention, attention everyone!" he called out through the microphone and the chatter died down, "Hello everyone, and welcome to the third USU congress meeting. My name is Ralph Lawson, and I will be your speaker for today. So if you could all kindly take your seats, we may begin shortly.
Suddenly, a voice called out that broke the silence. "Sorry I'm late, I took a bit longer than expected getting ready," the ex Greek prime minister, and current representative of Greece, scrambled to find his seat.
"Ah, Minister Mytsoakis! You're just on time, actually. Glad you could make it," Ralph spoke into the mic, "Let us begin."
The large display screen behind Ralph suddenly came alive with various images of the cavern and the creatures found within them. At the center of the screen, an image of Dr. Keifer, with Tirek and Cozy Glow flanking him on either side was displayed.
"Let's begin with the first topic. I'm sure you have all been briefed on the situation we are currently in. The type of animals present on earth have changed drastically, but that is not the main issue at hand," the screen zoomed in on the image of Keifer and the two aliens, "These are members of the dominant species that are currently inhabiting Earth's surface. More specifically, the one on the right is." The screen zoomed in on the face of Cozy Glow, "These are ponies. They are - "
"We've already been through the briefing. They are the dominant species, they enslaved humanity, and they have magic," the Swedish representative called out, "And yes, we know that the capabilities of this magic is currently unknown."
"Well yes, but I was just going through the briefing," Ralph defended, "Very well then. If you wish to move on and skip the recap, we may. Let's have a vote, green to go through the recap, red to move past the recap, and grey to refrain from voting."
He set up the poll and everyone turned their iPads on, pressing on the congress app. The large screen in front of congress changed, now showing a pie chart with green, red and blue sections. The portions and percentages kept switching for a few seconds, until it showed that everyone had voted. The green portion took up more than one third of the pie chart, having the number 69% displayed on it. The red section displayed 14% and the grey section displayed 17%.
"Very well, we'll skip the recap and get straight towards the action then," Ralph said, "We have done several autopsies on those that had passed away while frozen. What we found was that there was a radiation leakage. Whatever mechanism that was supposed to limit the amount of radiation we were exposed to malfunctioned, which resulted in a small scale beach between the ground and the inside of Utopia."
"How could this happen? We have the top engineers! The top scientists! This is their fault!" one voice called out and the others voiced their agreements.
"Everyone, please!" the speaker raised the volume of his mic, quieting down the sudden uproar of chaos, "This was not due to human error. This happened because of the natural degradation of those mechanisms. They may have been top quality, but one million years would still take its toll on even the sturdiest of objects."
"Was there any foul play involved?" Someone asked.
"The engineers and mechanics have already looked at the mechanism, and Head Peacekeeper Yang himself has officially ruled out foul play," he said, "But do not worry, the situation has been contained. Our developed immunity, coupled with the lessened radiation levels ensures that whatever chaos radiation that does manage to get in will not be of any danger to us."
"Now, if we could move on to the next topic," the speaker beckoned Atticus to stand up, "President Atticus, if you please."
The President stood up and a cameraman zoomed in on him. The top of his head, up to his belly was now projected onto the large screen at the center of the House of Representatives. He straightened his suit, and placed both hands on the podium. He began to speak.
"Hello, all of you. The reason I called for an emergency meeting, and on such short notice, is to begin discussion on a first contact operation. I know that it has only been two days since our awakening, but I wish to make first contact as soon as possible. And by as soon as possible, I mean either tomorrow or the day after," Atticus said to which a massive uproar of arguments suddenly erupted. What they were saying was completely inaudible, due to the fact that almost everyone was shouting all at the same time. But all Atticus had to do was raise a hand. It didn't work immediately, with everyone still shouting, but the awkwardness of essentially shouting at a wall that wasn't responding eventually set in, and after about a minute, the uproar had died down to a complete and awkward silence.
"I'm going to be frank with all of you. I'm doing this for selfish reasons," Atticus admitted, to everyone's surprise, "The reason I am doing this, is because my daughter, who is one of the last remaining children, is about to die because of chaotic radiation."
There were sudden cries of shock, gasps of surprise, and worried looks being thrown around. Most of the pre-flood nations' leaders knew Atticus's daughter quite well. Atticus had regular meetings with his allies, both business and casual, and Eris was present at most of his casual meetings with the other leaders of the pre-flood nations. Most of them knew her as a lively teenage girl with a happy go lucky attitude. She was fun to be around, nice to talk to, and extremely funny. In fact, most of the people here considered her their friend, and she had even offered some of them a shoulder to cry on. And now, she was dying. But someone still needed to address the elephant in the room.
"Atticus," Polish prime minister Olesia Piertreik began in a solemn tone, "I know that you must be very worried, and you might not be thinking clearly. How exactly is first contact going to help your daughter?"
"There is an individual known as Princess Twilight Sparkle. She was mentioned by the Centaur, Lord Tirek, who expressed that she might be capable of assisting," Atticus explained, "He informed us that she was extremely well versed in… magic."
The entire room fell silent. That was, until Minister Olesia broke the silence. "You can't be serious?" she asked in disbelief, "I know that eyewitness accounts said that the two creatures… vanished, but we know nothing about this apparent magic. I can hardly believe it myself! They could have easily been using advanced technology, and telling us it was magic."
"They said that their most advanced piece of technology is either the train, radio, or camera," Atticus said, "I highly doubt a civilisation that has technology from the 1800s would be capable of something like that through technological means."
"But even so, magic?" another representative asked, "Seems too far fetched."
"There's absolutely no way I'm voting in favor of making first contact without even knowing what they're capable of," another representative said, and strong voices of agreement were heard.
"You don't believe me? Fine, watch," the president said before tapping on his iPad. He turned to the cameraman, "Disconnect your bluetooth. I wanna connect mine," he said.
"Of course, sir," he said and did as asked, and the screen feed that previously displayed Atticus was replaced by a bright blue one which said 'no input'.
"What's the password?" the president asked the speaker.
"01ns10ejd2j9" the speaker replied, speaking each letter slowly and carefully so the president could catch it.
The massive screen came to life once again, now showing the home screen of Atticus's iPad, which had a wallpaper of a photo of him, together with his wife, two sons, and daughter smiling at the camera. He accessed his gallery and flipped through it until he found the video.
He played the video. It was a camera view from the top left corner of the room which showed Tirek disappear in a puff of black smoke, followed by Cozy Glow. The video was only two seconds long, but got the desired effect out of the representatives when murmurs began erupting.
"My daughter is one of the last remaining children in Utopia. This video… it shows all of you that she has a chance to live," the president said, "I ask you… no, I beg you, please allow me to initiate first contact. We are going to have to contact the ponies sooner or later, so why not save a life while we're at it?"
"I'm sorry Atticus, but this is still a bit far-fetched for me," one of the representatives said.
"It's too risky. We know next to nothing about their species, and we do know was information gained through a fifteen year old child and someone who isn't even a pony himself," a representative spoke up, "That's not even taking into account that those two individuals are convicted felons."
"We have to find out more before we act," one representative spoke, and yells of support emitted from the others, "We cannot go in blind. We must observe them first, determine their capabilities, and see how much of a threat this 'magic' is."
"If they can teleport right into our nuclear weapon storage facility, it's game over for all of us," the Italian representative stated, and an outcry of worried ministers all began shouting at the same time upon this revelation.
The speaker muted their mics, but when that didn't work, he began banging his mallet on the granite hard. It took some time, but the representatives eventually quieted down.
"Act in a disorderly manner again and you will be removed from this meeting!" the speaker said in a stern tone, "President Atticus, you may continue."
"I have a proposal," the president said, "I agree with all of you. We simply do not have enough information. However, I plan on sending in drones for a twenty four hour observation period, and what we observe will determine how we initiate first contact."
"I disagree," a representative opposed, "We need a minimum of one month of observation before we begin to even think of first contact."
"President Atticus is right. If Eris is in trouble, we should use this opportunity to help her. We're going to have to initiate contact anyway so why not do it now, and have a chance at saving her?" a representative voiced her support.
"Twenty four hours is more than enough time to make observations!" another called out.
"Are you stupid?!" another rudely shouted, "What are we going to determine in twenty four hours?! The town's most used brand of toasters?!"
"What do you expect to gain out of an entire month of surveillance?!" the previous representative asked.
"The capabilities of this newfound 'magic'!" he retorted.
The entire parliament devolved into arguments and insults. Each side's ministers voiced valid points, all of which the ones on the opposing side didn't care about. The only ones not participating in the argument were the president, vice president, and speaker.
"I'm not paid enough for this," Ralph said to himself, "Wait… I'm not even paid."
"QUIET!" Ralph screamed at the top of his lungs after raising his microphone's volume to the max. The effect was instant, with the entire room going silent. "Thank you. I believe you've all made your points very clear over the past fifteen minutes of arguing. Now, can we please continue this meeting in a proper and organised manner?" the speaker asked rhetorically.
"What makes you think that their apparent magic can help your daughter anyway?" Olesia asked.
"Nothing makes me think it can help her, but it at least gives her a chance," Atticus stated.
"So you're being this on a hunch?" Olesia asked.
"If saving Eris isn't a good enough reason, let me give you another one," Atticus began, "Both of these individuals stated that humanity was enslaved by the other species inhabiting this planet. If not for my daughter, do it for the rest of humanity. They have apparently been enslaved, and have been reduced to a bunch of savages. They need our help as well, and every minute wasted is another minute of humanity having to endure the barbarism of the ponies."
"I'm sorry Atticus, but I can't take that risk," Olesia said, "I vote against the motion!"
"I'm not asking to initiate first right now. I'm putting out a motion to scout out the area, then send a diplomat," the president said.
"Attention everyone, we have a motion to vote on," Ralph announced, "As usual, green to vote for the motion, red to go against the motion, and grey to abstain from voting."
Atticus disconnected his Bluetooth and the same pie chart that appeared earlier appeared on the screen. The numbers and portions kept switching, until the results eventually came on screen. The results ended up being 45% for, 45% against, and 10% abstained.
"Well, looks like we have a tie. This means Vice President Felix will get to vote, and will function as our tiebreaker," the speaker said before turning to the vice president, "Your vote, sir?"
"We all know I'm gonna support Atticus on this one. I vote for the motion," Felix said and Atticus sighed in relief.
"You're making a big mistake, Atticus," Olesia said.
"We'll see," Atticus said.
"Very well, the motion has been passed. If approved by the UN, drones will be sent to locate and observe the town known as Ponyville. Determining the course of action afterwards will be left completely under the jurisdiction of the United States army," Ralph said, "You will be notified of the course of action that will be taken. Any information pertaining to the nature of the ponies and of magic itself will be given to you privately, and will be discussed in the next meeting."
The screen switched to show the image of the Gates of Tartarus.
"Now, next on the docket, the doors leading to the cavern. They seem to be made of regular stone, however, they seem to be nearly indestructible. Further proof of this fact is that when we used a diamond tipped drill to get through, it merely scratched the door slightly, while the diamond used literally broke into pieces," the speaker explained, "This is presumably either a new, undiscovered substance, or further evidence of 'magic'. Do not worry though, the walls are just as tough as regular stone, and we have managed to break through it easily using regular explosives."
The meeting continued, discussing other matters pertaining to both Utopia, and the surface.
I'm really interested in seeing how ponies react to them, will they have the same prejudices that Cozy had or will it be a little mellowed out? I'm just hoping they're willing to actually TALK to each other before something drastic happens. Here's hoping for a first contact chapter next.
10921417
cozy is a child and she knows that stuff so im guessing the slavery of humans is alot more widespread and used then we would assume
Then also get the door for testing.
In the worst-case scenario, you will use it as a projectile XD
I have an idea
Did you watch RWBY?
What about creating, discovering a human ability or device(like a watch or something like that to wear) that will make an aura, force field around the body?
As Cozy said, magic is in everything even air
So powering it by siphoning magic would work.
I bet nothing that the drones will be shot down, pony’s being racist to humans, fight against them, war, then peace, then there will be lots of political fights.
10921431
I might introduce magically infused technology down the road. Even if I were to introduce personal forcefields, that would be much further down the road. They don't even know what exactly magic is at the moment.
10921438
I don't think anyone will even see the drones thanks to height and camouflage.
At their speed and how high they would be, no one would shoot them or even hit them.
And even if Rainbow tried she probably wouldn't be fast enough and if somehow will catch to them what will she do?
If she will try to ram it she will take damage too, so she will die from impact or hitting the ground
10921442
Also if Discord won't help/will be an annoyance to humans, for example:
-will make destroy,cancel peaceful diplomacy with Twilight
-his actions will result in or he himself won't go save the president's daughter
-if he will make obstacles in the way of humans
I hope humans will kill him for being a traitor.
Also, the president has 2 sons?
What if Discord is one of them, who just volunteered to be tested on radiation?
That would make it easier if this is true and he will choose his family over ponies.
It won't be necessary to kill him then
10921438
This:
10921444
10921447
Discord ain't the president's son lol
But I still really like that idea. I can see why you would come to that conclusion.
10921466
That would make it a genetic, why Eris would still be alive as draconequus
Because she is his sister.
So also a cure that could be extracted
10921444
My logic is that the Pegasi will report it and then they will destroy the drones, also, why would rainbow take damage? The drones are not the size of a house, more like the size of a laptop with a bit greater height. They can zap it with lightning or just hit it. If the drone flys faster then rainbow then the footage would be just be a blurred image or video. Rainbow dash is like the speed of a race car.
10921476
Even if they would see anything how they would know it wasn't their imagination?
It would be a flick of a movement, an image in the distance in the best scenario for them.
Even if they would report that and for some reason guards would investigate, what would they do?
What a average pegasus in armor would do ?
Drones can fly over clouds so no zapping with clouds,even then that would require the timing, that the drone won't change course, that they won't detect the threat, and that the drones aren't electric shockproof,but they would and are.
They won't destroy the drones in any way because of also how high they are. Add to that speed.
I mean even commercial drones can fly over clouds XD
https://petapixel.com/2016/03/10/idiot-flew-dji-camera-drone-11000-feet-clouds/
And even the small ones would be too small to see with just eyes.
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/2578439/u-s-military-unleashes-swarm-of-tiny-intelligent-micro-drones/
Please tell me you are trolling ,right ? XD
Did you even see military drones before commenting ?
d.newsweek.com/en/full/291666/drone.jpg
i1.wp.com/www.operationmilitarykids.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/MQ-9-Reaper-drone.png?resize=550%2C365&is-pending-load=1#038;ssl=1
I mean did you think they will use small commercial drones XD
Also they seems to have more advanced tech than what US has now
She would be hit by essentially colliding a flying jet, what do you think will happen to her externally and internally!
The drone would probably be fine, and the most damage Rainbow would do to it by hitting is slitghty changing it's direction, but it would just redirect itself.
While Rainbow would spiral out of control and die in many ways
They have special cameras!
They will see her clearly
If not then the drone wouldn't be able to record anything at all when in movement
Ok let's give her speed benefit of the doubt that she is somewhat fast like NASCAR vehicles.
NASCAR vehicles have the ability to reach 230 MPH average. site
And she still has organs to check on or she will be a paste form inside , so no sharp turns at that speed or sudden stops.
RQ-4 drone-391 mph (max speed), 357 mph (cruise speed), 32+ hours endurance
MQ-9 Reaper-300 mph (max speed), 194 mph (cruise speed), 14 hours endurance
Avenger (General Atomics)-460 mph (max speed), 402 mph (cruise speed), 18 hours of endurance
site
Count also that in the end Rainbow is a meat sack like I pointed out a little above, so she will have to rest at some point,eat or relieve herself,etc
So I have a question, what makes the ponies barbaric. Now hold on and let me explain! I'm more than open to debate. If humanity attempted to conquer all of Earth/Equus for no apparent reason then what is so bad about subjugating them to prevent another uprising. The story so far depicted them as the savages and the ponies utilizing their savagery for labor. Raping is all that they do according to Cozy Glow and Tirek. All humanity in Utopia only know that the outside humans are practically animals so why would they paint ponies as the savages? If that’s the case does that mean that we are barbarians for enslaving pigs?
Your story is surprisingly engaging. I love the character and the setting so far. You sir are being followed…wait.
10921484
“They’re savage animals that rape things” was pretty much word for word how people described slaves in the 1800s.
10921484
These humans that survived the flood were once intelligent like them but ponies turned them into animals and slaves, while also stealing what was theirs, like trains
The difference to pigs is that pigs never were intelligent
10921482
I now get your point, I though they were using those mini drones to not be seen. Since in Equestria destroying clouds is a common thing I expected them to not use the big ones as they would be spotted in the clear sky.
10921545
https://www.quora.com/Why-arent-military-drones-visible-in-a-clear-sky
They especially won't see the military drones
Even in the clear sky
10921553
Thanks for the info and now I fully understand you point.
10921476
10921482
And also I highly doubt that rainbow, or anyone else for that matter, would try destroying a UFO the moment they saw it. If it wasn't acting hostile, there would be no reason for them to provoke the flying pieces of metal.
10921484
The humans in story basically became Nazis out of the blue (well, not out of the blue but more on that later). When WW2 was over, did the rest of the world end up enslaving the Germans, who did much worse things than the humans in this universe?
10921490
Thanks man, appreciate it
10921469
Yea, that's what I guessed you guessed
10921506
I suppose. Good point.
10921589
I guess that makes sense. Im just going off what the story told me so sorry if I sounded ignorant.
10921598
No u didn't sound that ignorant lol. I can see where you're coming from.
Foreshadowing?
10921629
Well, I didn't plan on using that as a foreshadowing phrase.
I guess... accidental foreshadowing??
Wait how many children are left?
Like under 18 years old, not adults.
I mean as long as there are adults that can reproduce or they have a cloning technique that randomizes genes to be more natural, these things would fix it.
Ah, the steel door in a plywood wall mistake. I can see the ponies putting up an indestructible door while forgetting about the wall next to it. XD
I like the story so far. The pacing is on point and I'm looking forward to the first contact
I like this story so far but I hate the mention of iPads, does it have to be iPads instead a generic tablet, takes me out of the story every time since you have this super futuristic vault with an AI and everything and then you mention a name brand tablet it would be the same thing as saying "google pixel" every time you mentioned a phone. Just ruins it for me, the rest of the story is nice though.
10921806
Maybe everything was built by apple XD
The other utopias (If I remember correctly that there were others) maybe were built by google and SpaceX, Tesla, Boring Company,Neuralink (Elon Musk) XD
Im pretty sure its suppose to be 20% abstained right?
If ponies are ignorant as our own species, this would take an un expected turn of events.
when president Atticus speaks, is anyone else reading his lines with J. K. Simmons voice?
beach in the last sentence should be breach
uh, this doesn't make sense. where did the extra 10% run off to?
10922156
Murdered while litigating.
Don't know why but I could imagine them somehow, someway, in the form of the Navy way, still have a navy in a similar bunker somewhere that would consist of several destroyers, maybe 2-3 aircraft carriers, a couple of subs and in the case that aircraft are a bit faulty after so long throw in 4 battleships to give the extra punch and for the sakes of having them.
Cuz nothing says Gunboat Diplomacy then having giant ships with giant guns pointed at wooden ship-of-the-line that have to get within grenade throwing distance to be 'effective'.
10922156
Indeed, 10% gone hiding, small mistake
Can't wait for more to come. I wonder though how all this be approached. I can see Twilight be one of the more open minded pon here, poison joke incident with Zecora. That said there plenty explosives and flammables in this pile of plot, trigger happy soldiers, cultural shock, prejudice to have a powder cake to blow.
The Cryo Humans though are defenatly outnumbered, and magic is a wild card. Gotta be cool headed and cautious.
What does blue mean?
Didn’t green mean to recap?
How do they know yang isn’t involved?
So you’re potentially f*cking over thousands of people for one person?
So she’s basically a cinnamon roll.
One month? How much information do you need?
He seems a little too interested in magic.
Good point.
Welp Warhammer 40k Imp I think .
no way these humans are like so chowders!
10924651
It was already said
I would suggest reading comments by newest and also replies to them
Seriously, and 45% are fine with this? 45% of global politicians are fine with US Army going solo for first-contact?
10925231
The president is the highest military authority as well, so yea.
Wait what? But most people voted green?
11024979
I think it is an error
He the old adventurer tactic, "if the door's too tough, try breaking through the wall."
Does that mean in this universe Lyra does not like Humans?